Lime Cordiale: Enough of the Sweet Talk (digital outlets)

As we have noted previously in reference to the Australian brothers Oli and Louis Leimbach, we are shameless in our love of pop music which does little more than entertain and make us feel good for the running time of the song.

Therapeutic music, stuff where an artist faces their demons or deals with emotional isolation in lockdown are all very well and we take them seriously, but sometimes you just want pop.

Lime Cordiale deliver exactly that with clever arrangements, lyrics which push the envelope beyond boy-girl/boy-boy/girl-girl (or whatever combination you like).

Check The Milkman which opens with “Cowhide rug, stain glass window. Her lampshade of Frida Kahlo, soft for wine and Aldous Harding. She'll stock your fridge, she'll host your party”.

Something smart goes on with these guys, as on the wordy title track: “Dear local MP, I've been writing, but you don't get back to me. I'm not paranoid, just a bit annoyed 'cause I don't feel like wasting my voice”. All that to a tune of chiming steel guitar and a hefty, driving backbeat.

And before Happiness Seasons explodes with huge chords it opens with, "Now this story needs some space for imagination. Sit down, get a coffee to that face and I'll explain my situation. She's a coffee snob like you, tried religion, found it rude. Cuts old-fashion magazines, slips her butt into her jeans, she exceeds my wild expectations . . .”

You can of course just let the lyrics go past you and live with the pop, power pop, jangle pop, folk pop and easy rolling ballads.

Yes, there are flat points (Country Club, and on When I'm Losing It we hear the archetypal croaky sensitive faux-soul white boy delivery which is all over antipodean pop) and it does seem on the long side (the short “cue” interpolations add nothing).

But at their best Lime Cordiale deliver interesting pop (The Big Reveal; Ou L'Hypocrite) which doesn't talk down to you.

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You can hear this album at Spotify here